Having assessed in the last three posts the impacts of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) over the last five years, we have seen that the ACA will not bring universal access, contain health care costs for patients and taxpayers, or improve the quality of care.

Republican Texas Senator Ted Cruz has announced his candidacy for President of the United States. While critics, including some in his own party, dismiss him, Cruz is a smart, shrewd and brash politician. He is also arrogant, self-confident and power-hungry.

The Latino National Health and Immigration Survey provides some of the most comprehensive data on Latinos' attitudes toward and interactions with the Affordable Care Act at this important period in the law's history. We provide some of the key findings from this important survey specific to the ACA.

If you thought that the Affordable Care Act, aka Obamacare, completely solved the health insurance problem for the United States, then you will probably be happy with some of the types of reforms that are being crafted to address the retirement crisis.

While portions of the ACA continue to be debated, using the tools within the ACA to drive innovation in the public and private sector at the community, state and federal levels should be a priority for all who care about better care at lower costs.

As the Supreme Court listened to arguments over subsidies in the state exchanges Democrats were making their plans for preemptive surrender. Many were warning that an adverse ruling would be the death of Obamacare.

In this second post assessing the track record of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) five years after its enactment, we now look at its impact on containment of health care costs and affordability of care, two of its principal goals.

Clearly written and brimming with telling historical details and sharp insights, The Fierce Urgency of Now is essential reading not only for those who want to understand the Great Society but for everyone concerned with how it might be preserved or expanded.

Solicitor General Donald B. Verrilli Jr. is this week's Most Impressive Democrat of the Week award-winner, for doing a much better job arguing the case for President Obama's interpretation of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act before the Supreme Court than he did the last time around.

Because insurers don't know which way the Supreme Court will rule come June, they reportedly are thinking of pricing their policies for 2016 based on the worst-case scenario of a plaintiffs' victory. Those rates will be higher than they would have been if the Supreme Court had never agreed to take King v. Burwell.

When I found myself with a fresh wave of anxiety before the Supreme Court heard oral arguments yesterday on the latest assault on the law, I decided to list all the times that the survival of what became the Affordable Care Act was up in the air. It turned out that they number eight. So if Obamacare survives this last, desperate challenge, it really will have nine lives.

5. This argument makes clear how important it is to have the right Justices on the Supreme Court. It's not just for the big-forest constitutional questions but for the in-the-trees statutory questions where a lot of our law is made, and where all of us have a very important stake.

If the Supreme Court invalidates premium credits in the federal exchange, the number of uninsured Americans would jump by roughly 8 million. Millions more would face dramatic premium increases; RAND estimates that premiums would jump by 47 percent.

The challenge to the Affordable Care Act heard before the U.S. Supreme Court on March 4 is supported and bankrolled by a right-wing think tank most widely known for its campaign against environmental regulation, or "eco-socialism."

The ACA creates insurance-market exchanges through which anyone can purchase private health-insurance policies. In an attempt to subvert the law, most states governed by Republicans refused to establish exchanges.

Republicans in Congress have been saying for five years now that their top priority is to "repeal and replace" Obamacare. The problem, however, is that they are now scrambling to come up with something (anything!) that would help convince John Roberts to vote against the ACA.